


Nine of Sword

by Hermit9



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M, POV Castiel (Supernatural), Tarot Anthology, recollection, time is a construct
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-15
Updated: 2020-11-15
Packaged: 2021-03-10 00:21:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27575123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hermit9/pseuds/Hermit9
Summary: nine of swordsSuffering from anguish, fear, anxiety, guilt, uncertainties in the night.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Kudos: 9





	Nine of Sword

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written for the Tarot Supernatural Anthology.
> 
> Inspiration taken from the [Shadowscapes Tarot](https://www.shadowscapes.com/Tarot/cards.php?suit=3&card=8)

Castiel sits on the bench, feeling the rough wood under his fingertips as his nails catch the layers of paint. He can hear the water running through the thin walls and the single pane of glass of the window. Dean is in there, washing away the hunt and the blood, no doubt using up all the hot water. Castiel doesn’t mind. He feels the fatigue in his own muscles, the painful abrasions along his back, the tacky feel of cooled sweat under his clothes. The little annoyances of letting his vessel—his body—play at being human. He could use his grace to maintain it, but he has grown reluctant to do so. Not just in solidarity with Dean, who waves off healing for anything less serious than a broken arm. Grace keeps Castiel’s body in stasis, unmoving, unchanging. With each year, that idea grows more distasteful to Castiel. Some warped and fallen part of him is looking forward to growing old.

He closes his eyes and stretches, out of his body and the constraints of a singular reality. Castiel lets his consciousness fill his true form, like a tremor under his many eyes. His wings ache where they were broken and never mended. He can never be made whole. He has had time, but making peace with that knowledge is still a process. He stretches his grace to brush against the stuttering workings of Heaven, and his perception fractures. 

He is standing in a barn. The protection sigils graze against his skin, soft like a caress. Inhabiting a vessel again is alien, a confusing blanket that stifles him. The limbs are the wrong size, the hair too short and the clothes so very different from his last visit on Earth. The skin is not his own, but it serves its function and he feels the sparks from the blown lamps, the wind whipping at him. The cold of the blade as it plunges into his heart and the warmth of Dean’s breath while he stands there, confused, angry. Defiant. Dean’s eyes are very green, wide and scared and still the human doesn’t back down. He is beautiful, more than Castiel had known as he had reconstructed him atom by atom. Castiel falls.

He is in Purgatory, washing the dirt from his face, hospital scrubs itchy and covered in grime. Dean’s smile is the only bright thing in this place as he clasps Castiel to his chest. Dean is filthy and covered in drying blood, yet it’s the most soothing embrace. He pushes Dean through the portal, tumbles down the hill and runs. He feels hollow.

Screams rise around him, parting like the flames, as he rends souls so twisted he can barely call them souls at all. Castiel signals and his siblings break formation, flowing around the larger obstacles and the foes that would slow them down. A single demon is no threat, but they mass like ants, a thousand shallow bites until the last one kills. If he had time, even a second, he would marvel at the beauty of it, the exacting precision of the flight. They bring the light of salvation where it should not exist. He has lost many already and their absence tugs at Castiel like a phantom limb, a dull ache he will carry forever more. And yet—and yet. He can see his goal, his mission. The righteous man, the Michael Sword. The soul shines brighter than the grace that sparks all around them as Castiel lays siege to Hell. He gives the word and two angels fall ahead, fizzling in the explosive force of their deaths. The gate of hell bend and open, torn and jagged like a gaping maw. The sacrifice is costly, but its effectiveness cannot be understated. Castiel’s grief is tainted by awe as he flies away, cradling the soul to his breast. 

Castiel stands on the perfect green grass of an eternal Tuesday afternoon. He can hear Dean praying to him, cursing his name. There is a field of ash in front of him, scores of his enemies, fallen and marked by the ghosts of their wings. He feels nothing at all. 

Dean is on his knees, bleeding, pleading but the words are buzzing in his ears like white noise. The words are not real, the blade in his hand is real. He knows Naomi is real, her word absolute. He drops the blade. It burrows in the book by his head, trembling from the force in Dean’s hand, the barely contained rage in him. There is blood, but the tears will wash it off.

_“And anytime you feel the pain, hey Jude, refrain_  
_Don't carry the world upon your shoulders”_

Tanya coos and babbles as Dean sings. He has a great singing voice when he’s not annoying his brother. Dean winks at Cas and puts Tanya down in her crib.

“You’re good at this,” Cas says. It’s true.

“Yeah, well. I’ve had lots of practice,” Dean answers. Neither of them want to speak of the unspoken thing here. Dean would be a great father, was for a year before Castiel messed everything up. Will never be again, as long as he stays in the life. Dean will never leave the life. Castiel kisses him that night. He is human, warm, real. Dean kisses back then shakes his head. 

“I can’t,” he says. Castiel doesn’t ask why. Dean drops him off in the morning and Castiel knows it’s only fair. He usually is the one who leaves.

Warmth presses at his side, sparking against the nerves, soaking through the clothes. It’s followed by pressure, the feeling of it too small and yet too vast for Castiel to cope with. It calls him, takes over his senses. His whole world.

Castiel reels his vision in, overwhelmed by details at first, from cells to the bright lines of sparking nerves. Skin. Dean’s hand, intertwined with his own.

“Hey, you with me?” Dean asks. 

“Humm,” Castiel answers, thumb moving to rub against Dean’s hand. “Listening to angel radio, mostly.”

“Oh yeah? Any good songs?” 

He smiles. “Ours.” Castiel leans and kisses the lips of the soul he loves. 


End file.
